


Nexu Smile

by ShyMikka



Category: Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic (Video Game)
Genre: Developing Relationship, Drunken Flirting, Drunkenness, Enthusiastic Consent, F/F, Green Jedi, Nonbinary Character, Relationship Negotiation, T7 is a good wingbeing, nonbinary T7-O1
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-18
Updated: 2021-02-18
Packaged: 2021-03-13 20:41:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,752
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29532141
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShyMikka/pseuds/ShyMikka
Summary: A night of celebratory drinking leads to an awful lot of awkwardness. It also leads to a couple of Jedi talking about their feelings, which is probably against the Jedi code.
Relationships: Kira Carsen/Female Jedi Knight | Hero of Tython
Kudos: 14





	Nexu Smile

**Author's Note:**

> Here I am, showing up ten years late to a fandom with Starbucks. Very minor spoilers for the Jedi Knight story in Star Wars: The Old Republic.

“Well, that happened.” Kira was sitting in the lounge, elbows on the table with her head in her hands.

“Are you talking about getting shot in the stealth generator or crawling through the sewers to fight a Sith?” Lanya asked.

“Eh, I was more thinking about convincing a gang boss that I could read his mind.” Lanya could hear the smile in Kira’s voice. For a Jedi, Kira showed an awful lot of emotion. “Good times.”

“What does it say about today that getting a ship is actually not on the list of most unexpected things to happen?”

“That today was drunk?” Kira paused. There was no way a pause that long could end well. Lanya had known her for less than a week, but she was sure that a pause like that meant chaos was coming.

“We should get a drink.” Kira pronounced, with the absolute certainty of someone who knows how to make terrible ideas seem good. “I know a place.”

***

“How did I let you talk me into this?” Lanya could feel the bruise on her face throbbing. Which, given the number of injuries they had taken fighting their way across Coruscant, was saying something.

“I have a natural charm.” Kira pulled something out of the conservator. She then threw it at Lanya’s head. “This’ll help.”

Lanya had exceptional reflexes. However, when telling the story later she would point out that she was not only still somewhat drunk, but had also fought a Sith lord less than twelve hours previously. And her eyes were closed. She felt something wet slap against her face.

“Kira, what am I supposed to do with a raw chunk of...bantha? Is this bantha? Why are you throwing bantha at me?”

“Put it on the bruise, it’ll make it better.”

“That makes zero medical sense. If bantha cured broken faces, we wouldn’t need kolto.” She stared at the steak, trying to gauge it’s secret medical properties. “Can’t you just force heal it? I would, but I’m tipsy, and I’m actually really terrible at it.”

“Nope. People who start cantina brawls do not get force healing. It’s one of Master Kiwiiks rules.”

“What, and you’re just gonna enforce it?” Lanya tried to put as much pout in the question as she could. Pouting might help.

She felt the cushion she was on shift. Somehow, Kira had managed to cross the cabin without her noticing it. She reached down, gently pulled the steak out of Lanya’s hands, and held it against the bruise. Lanya suddenly realized that her new sort-of padawan was spooning her on the deck of their new ship’s lounge.

The only thing that made it not weird was the steak.

“Trust me.” Kira’s voice was right there. She knew that Kira hadn’t whispered it. But her brain somehow parsed it that way. She knew that Kira wasn’t flirting. No one flirted with raw meat. It wasn’t sanitary!

“What does being sanitary have to do with it?” Kira asked.

Lanya didn’t panic. Jedi Knights did not panic. They just...rapidly accessed all possible worst case scenarios at once.

“I thought you couldn’t read minds?”

“You said it out loud.” Lanya could hear the smile again. Then, just next to her ear, she whispered, “Trust me.”

Lanya shivered. She closed her eyes and felt Kira’s warmth around her. She extended her senses further, feeling the Force around them. She feels Kira, and feels the way the Force pulls at both of them.

“I do.” It’s not quite a whisper.

She pulls away from Kira, taking the steak with her.

“But I don’t trust me. Not when you’ve been feeding me Ryloth Sunsets.”

Kira doesn’t look mad, really. Just a little hurt. That is the last thing Lanya wants.

“Look, this isn’t bad, or unwanted or anything. I just, I think we should be at least one hundred percent sober before…” she lets the sentence trail off.

Kira smiles, and it’s a nexu smile, full of teeth and promise.

“I’m holding you to that. Now, sleep it off. We gotta save the galaxy tomorrow.”

Lanya shuffles off toward her cabin. She hates herself for being responsible, but she knows how easy it is for her to get attached. 

***

Breakfast is blissfully free of awkwardness, though Kira is unnaturally cheerful. Teeseven is their usual chirpy self.

“Unnamed Defender class corvette = fueled // hyperspace jump = calculated” the droid says hopefully.

“Take us out, Teeseven.”

Lanya joins the droid on the bridge. As they hit Coruscant’s upper atmosphere, Kira joins them. She hands Lanya a cup of caf. She nods her thanks. She takes a sip, notes that it has just enough lightener to make it bearable. Kira, she decides, notices way too much.

Once they’re in orbit, Teeseven plots the course to the jump point. Lanya wishes that they could just hit hyperspace as soon as they were out of the gravity well, but there is just too much traffic this close to the capitol for that to be safe.

“How long until we can jump?”

“Safe jump location = 2 standard hours + 19 minutes”

Lanya whistles. Her ship is fast. The shuttle from the fleet had cruised along at sublight for nine hours on the trip in.

“How long until we reach the orbital station?”

“Total time in transit = 11 standard hours + 37 minutes // Unnamed Defender class corvette = GLH”

“What does gee ell aitch mean?” Kira asks.

“GLH = acronym // acronym in basic = goes like hell”

***

She and Kira haven’t been avoiding each other, exactly, they just haven’t managed to be in the same place at the same time. Lanya didn’t realize how big her new ship was. Which is why lunch is the perfect time to talk.

Lunch is cold cuts and crackers, as well as bantha milk cheese. It’s the little things, Lanya decides, that make life enjoyable. She has always struggled with the austerity that the Jedi Order espouses. Brown is a fine color, but it isn’t the only one. She remembers getting side eyed by various masters on Tython for wearing her letheris jacket. As if some of the gold robes they wore were somehow better.

The silence as they eat isn’t awkward. Jedi are above such petty things as awkwardness, after all. Lanya would like to think that it’s a dignified silence, but it’s more likely to be a strained silence. She briefly wonders why the galaxy needs so many different kinds of silence, but then stomps down on that train of thought. It’s not helpful.

She might be avoiding this conversation.

“So…” they both start at nearly the same time. Lanya chuckles, Kira smiles and shakes her head. Lanya feels a weight she hadn’t realized she was carrying lift. Kira isn’t upset, they’re both just really self-conscious when they’re sober.

“I’m sorry.” Kira starts before Lanya has a chance to say anything. “Look, we were drunk, and you might have been a little concussed. I heard you talk about flirting and it just seemed like a good idea.”

Her head dips, like she’s blaming herself for something. Oh, stars, this is not how she wanted the conversation to go.

“Anyway, it won’t happen again.” Kira smiles, and it is just wrong. It doesn’t reach her cheeks, much less her eyes, and Lanya doesn’t need to extend her senses to feel the wrongness in the Force.

“Do you want it to happen again?” she asks quietly.

Kira freezes like a nerf caught in a headlight.

“Because if you don’t, it won’t.” Lanya speaks softly, sending out her emotions in the force. “But if you wanted to flirt, well...I’d be okay with that.”

“Huh?”

“Look, I’m not saying I want to break the code with you and start dating, but I’m not not saying that either. You’re smart, and funny, and the only other Jedi I know who’s willing to exist outside of the monastic box the Jedi get stuck in. Plus, and I say this with nothing but the greatest respect, you are smokin’ hot.” Lanya can feel the blush crawling up her face.

“What about the code?” Kira asks. It’s a sensible question.

“Well, the code and I have a complicated relationship. Did you know I was born on Corellia? Most of my early training was with the greenies. They have a real relaxed view on attachment. Kriffing hells, they get married, have kids! I left because I refused to only care about one planet, but I never really did take to the Tython code that well. I don't make a big thing about it because most of the Order sees the Green Jedi as barely better than the Sith.”

The silence stretches out like the stars during a hyperspace jump. Kira was making her thoughtful face. Lanya isn’t sure what to think. On one hand, outing herself as believing in what the Jedi considered heresy was possibly not the best idea she had ever had. On the other, she was tired of the Tython code. She didn’t agree with the greenies about everything, especially their jingoism, but she did believe that the light could coexist with emotion and attachment.

“So,” Kira asks finally, “is this why you wear that stupid jacket?’

“Hey, my jacket is cool!”

“I mean, I guess if you’re into swoop gangs covered in youngling puke, it’s kinda cool.” Kira is smiling, and it’s wonderful.

“Fine, you caught me. My letheris jacket is green because I’m from Corellia.” Lanya says without emotion. “It has nothing to do with the fact that I look good in olive.”

“Yup. I was pretty sure that was just a cover. No one wears olive by choice.” Kira keeps smiling. “So, uh, yeah. I’m not really sure how far I’m willing to go right now. Just so you know.”

“That’s okay. I don’t really know how far I’m willing to go either. But I’m pretty sure we took out a Sith by winging it.”

“I can work with winging it.” Kira’s face gets serious. “Either one of us says stop, full stop, okay?”

“Same goes for slow down.” Lanya agrees.

“Cool.” She looks down the passageway to where Teeseven is watching the readouts. “Hey, Teeseven, how long until we land?”

“Time to landing = 5 hours + 19 minutes” Teeseven announces. “Time to landing = acceptable makeout duration? // If not = reroute for longer transit”

“Where did you learn to be such a good wingbeing, Teeseven?” Lanya laughs.

“Lanya + Kira ≠ T7’s first rodeo”

Kira holds out her hand. “So, wanna make out for a while?” 

“I’d love to.”


End file.
